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How Kinky Sex is Related to Happiness and Creativity

An altered state of consciousness may be behind the whip and gag after a recent study found that BDSM and kink-focused sex can heighten your sense of creativity.

Rena McDaniel, a Chicago sexologist told Bustle that “Kinks, much like like sexual orientation and gender identity, are created through a complex interplay that research doesn’t fully understand of genetics, environment, and our experiences paired with sexually relevant contexts.” Where our kinks stem from cannot fully be explained. Why we are sexually aroused by a color, an action, a feeling, a situation, isn’t always so matter of fact — there isn’t a specific formula or explanation of certain kinks. What we can explain, however, is the way that these kinks make human beings feel.

Researchers at the Science of BDSM Research Team at Northern Illinois University worked with seven pairs of “switches,” a role where the individual is interested in both the top and bottom, the submissive and the dominant.

“Gentle touching and communication to striking, bondage and fetish dress,” were examples of the experimental scenes that 14 adults from the ages of 23 to 64 engaged in during the research. The participants were from the kink-focused network Fetlife — think Facebook, but for kinksters.

The activities that the participants engaged in produced two types of altered states, as well as the reduction of psychological stress, the improvement of mood, and the increase of sexual arousal. In order to understand the levels of altered states, the participants were asked to give five saliva samples and complete three Stroop tests which involve words and colors before and after the experimental scenes.

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The two different types of altered states, which are typically associated with creativity, are affiliated with the two roles of bottom and top. Being on top is aligned with Csikszentmihalyi’s flow and bottoming is both Dietrich’s transient hypofrontality and Csikszentmihalyi’s flow.

Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, who coined the term in 1990, explained to Wire Magazine that, “The ego falls away. Time flies. Every action, movement, and thought follows inevitably from the previous one, like playing jazz. Your whole being is involved, and you’re using your skills to the utmost.”

In another study under Dr. Andreas Wismeijer, a psychologist from Tilburg University, found that BDSM practitioners are “more likely to be extroverted and open to new experiences and less neurotic.” People who participate in BDSM are more happy than those who do not, and they feel more secure in their relationships. In the study, “Dominants tended to be the most balanced, submissives the least and switches were in the middle.” Nevertheless, the submissives still scored higher than those who do not engage in the BDSM scene.

“Sometimes kinks come from our brains pairing an otherwise non-sexual, neutral object, body part, or situation with a sexually relevant context. These pairings can happen at any point in our life. For example, if you happened to have a really great masturbation session on a blue couch, then suddenly blue couches might start making you a little hot and bothered,” explains Rena McDaniel to Bustle. Kinks, pairings, and turn-ons aren’t always perfectly explained in the mind so why not just enjoy them as they come (literally)?

The study sheds light on the kink community, an often stigmatized and stereotyped group of people. Even Webster’s dictionary defines the word, “kinky” as an “unusual behavior.” Let’s celebrate the kinksters and abolish any type of misunderstanding for something that isn’t a vanilla and heterosexual experience. What the world sees as perversions, are actually beneficial connections to the mind and body.

IMAGE COURTESY OF GETTYIMAGES

By S. Nicole Lane on March 14, 2017 Nicole is a women's health journalist living in Chicago. Her sex and art column, "Intimate Justice" can be found on Sixty Inches from Center. She also contributes to The Establishment, HelloGiggles, GO Magazine, and elsewhere. In addition to writing she is an artist who works with assemblage and sculpture. She tweets at @snicolelane.